Gold Star Mom Urges End To Iran War In Mother’s Day TV Ad
WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Mother’s Day, the Vet Voice Foundation is launching a $500,000 national advertising campaign featuring Gold Star mother Vickie Castro of Corona, California, with a direct appeal to the mothers of American servicemembers currently deployed in the Middle East: it doesn’t have to end the way it ended for her. Gold Star family members are those whose loved ones died in war. The ad can be seen here. Vickie Castro’s only child, Cpl. Jonathan Castro, was a 21-year-old combat engineer with the 73rd Engineer Company, 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division (Stryker Brigade Combat Team) out of Fort Lewis, Washington. His three-year enlistment was scheduled to end in June 2004. Instead, the Army extended his service under a stop-loss order. On December 21, 2004, a suicide bomber walked into the dining facility at Forward Operating Base Marez in Mosul and detonated his explosives. Twenty-two people were killed, including 18 Americans. It was the deadliest attack on a U.S. installation of the Iraq War. Cpl. Castro was among the dead. In the new 30-second spot, titled “Remember,” Vickie speaks directly to the mothers of today’s deployed servicemembers over images of the false intelligence and “Mission Accomplished” imagery that defined the rush to war in Iraq, then over footage of the current war with Iran: “This Mother’s Day, I remember. I remember the lies. I remember the rush to war without a plan. I remember my only child, Corporal Jonathan Castro, whose voice was silenced in Mosul, Iraq. Now it’s playing out again. The lies, the illegal rush to war. To every mom of every servicemember deployed — your child does not have to be next.” The ad will run on broadcast, streaming, and digital platforms over Mother’s Day weekend, with placements designed to reach mothers and women nationally. The release comes the same week President Trump, addressing a Military Mother’s Day event at the White House on Wednesday, described the Iran war — now in its second month, with 13 U.S. servicemembers killed in Operation Epic Fury — as a “skirmish” and likened it to a one-day military operation in Venezuela. National news coverage characterized the remarks as out of step with the scale and human cost of the conflict. Vickie Castro filmed her message that same day. Public opinion has turned sharply against the war. A Washington Post-ABC-Ipsos poll released earlier this week found disapproval at levels comparable to the Iraq War and Vietnam, with most Americans calling the war a mistake. Women in particular have moved decisively against the administration’s foreign policy: an Emerson College poll found 60 percent of women believe the administration is not putting “America first.” “On Wednesday, the President of the United States stood in the White House and called this war a ‘skirmish.’ It is not, and Vickie Castro knows what wars actually cost, because she paid it,” said Janessa Goldbeck, Marine Veteran and CEO of the Vet Voice Foundation. “American mothers have made themselves clear: they do not want this war. We are putting Vickie’s voice on televisions, phones, and laptops across this country on Mother’s Day because Gold Star mothers like her have paid the price and deserve to be heard.” Vote Vets
Black News 
WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Mother’s Day, the Vet Voice Foundation is launching a $500,000 national advertising campaign featuring Gold Star mother Vickie Castro of Corona, California, with a direct appeal to the mothers of American servicemembers currently deployed in the Middle East: it doesn’t have to end the way it ended for her. Gold Star family members are those whose loved ones died in war.
Vickie Castro’s only child, Cpl. Jonathan Castro, was a 21-year-old combat engineer with the 73rd Engineer Company, 1st Brigade, 25th Infantry Division (Stryker Brigade Combat Team) out of Fort Lewis, Washington. His three-year enlistment was scheduled to end in June 2004. Instead, the Army extended his service under a stop-loss order. On December 21, 2004, a suicide bomber walked into the dining facility at Forward Operating Base Marez in Mosul and detonated his explosives. Twenty-two people were killed, including 18 Americans. It was the deadliest attack on a U.S. installation of the Iraq War. Cpl. Castro was among the dead.
In the new 30-second spot, titled “Remember,” Vickie speaks directly to the mothers of today’s deployed servicemembers over images of the false intelligence and “Mission Accomplished” imagery that defined the rush to war in Iraq, then over footage of the current war with Iran:
“This Mother’s Day, I remember. I remember the lies. I remember the rush to war without a plan. I remember my only child, Corporal Jonathan Castro, whose voice was silenced in Mosul, Iraq. Now it’s playing out again. The lies, the illegal rush to war. To every mom of every servicemember deployed — your child does not have to be next.”
The ad will run on broadcast, streaming, and digital platforms over Mother’s Day weekend, with placements designed to reach mothers and women nationally.
The release comes the same week President Trump, addressing a Military Mother’s Day event at the White House on Wednesday, described the Iran war — now in its second month, with 13 U.S. servicemembers killed in Operation Epic Fury — as a “skirmish” and likened it to a one-day military operation in Venezuela. National news coverage characterized the remarks as out of step with the scale and human cost of the conflict. Vickie Castro filmed her message that same day.
Public opinion has turned sharply against the war. A Washington Post-ABC-Ipsos poll released earlier this week found disapproval at levels comparable to the Iraq War and Vietnam, with most Americans calling the war a mistake. Women in particular have moved decisively against the administration’s foreign policy: an Emerson College poll found 60 percent of women believe the administration is not putting “America first.”
“On Wednesday, the President of the United States stood in the White House and called this war a ‘skirmish.’ It is not, and Vickie Castro knows what wars actually cost, because she paid it,” said Janessa Goldbeck, Marine Veteran and CEO of the Vet Voice Foundation. “American mothers have made themselves clear: they do not want this war. We are putting Vickie’s voice on televisions, phones, and laptops across this country on Mother’s Day because Gold Star mothers like her have paid the price and deserve to be heard.”
Vote Vets
